pressure exceeds all meaning  and all that is down there

throughout the celestial empire, plans are never made, only

executed          “if it was your life you’d care”          faith

felled by death sounds echoes through man-

made caverns  overhead, carnivorous birds circle           I held

 

hands soiled by the erroneous belief in resurrection

or at least rest      belies the concrete truth spelled out in shattered

craters made with bullets                    spent casings spread beneath

weave a heavy, unstable blanket, held together only by principle:

rapid decline, short lifetime     properties of the radioactive     I see

 

the truth:     she was born of decay     she came to a place not free

of blemish or flaw, naturally made by water      nonsense

wounds heal when brushed with Chimayo dirt, not

spittle from a broken mouth    and all that is down there

pressures meaning to reveal itself           “I am

 

now a sojourner          born of the reactive

violent by process and principle”

***

Kate Ingold is a visual artist and poet working in a variety of media, from stitched and etched drawings on digital photographs to new and recycled textiles, sculptural and video installation, and image/text collage. Her chapbook, Dream of Water, was published by the Poetry Society of America in 2008.